Recent content by RonP

Mice and rats WILL chew wire. Make sure your wiring has an AFCI breaker to help prevent arcing and potential disaster.

After reading the entire tread, I may have a different perspective as to why I keep my birds. Eggs, meat, or cost, were never a consideration. My birds are compost and therapy birds... I designed and built my coop and run to house over 2 dozen birds with safety, ease, and comfort. I have...

Interesting responses. Realistically you need to consider your predators. I have similar predators. Coop is a solid wood shed, hardware cloth on windows. Open to run 24/7. Built my run to withstand a 150 pound hungry dog, but not a bear, a raccoon but not a rat. We do not have bears in our...

Here is a good link to start with. https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/mealworm-farming.492636/ I currently produce around 15-20,000 per month to treat my dozen or so birds daily... Hope this helps.

Personally, I would not count on the fake owl solution.

Birds seem to like to lay where others already have. Having eggs (fake) in several boxes helps somewhat to eliminate favorite nest boxes.

I believe stress to be a significant cause of premature death with our birds. My flock lives a cushy stress free life. Quality food, water, grit and oyster shell, 24/7. Sufficient spacing, 5-6 square feet per bird indoor, an additional 16 -17 square feet per bird outdoor run available 24/7...

I have a Belgian D'Uccles now in her 14th year. The last few years, including her 13th year, she laid around a dozen or so beautiful eggs per year. As my only bantam, they were easily identified. Perfectly smooth, hard, small, white eggs. My Barred Plymouth Rock now in her 13th year, is...

Try locating some free wood chips. Tree trimmers usually dump for free. Start with about 6-12 inches deep. As they disappear, add more until you have a dry surface. Keep adding as needed.

Great question. My box heaters, when on during the daytime, consume about 51 Watts. Water heater, when on, 50 watts. When all on, about 101 watts. A hen gives off about 10 watts (35 BTUs) of energy, so ten chickens give off about as much heat as a 100 watt light bulb. My coop has about 1000...

Well, 7F ambient outside the coop 7:00 am this morning in Central NJ. I don't concern myself with wind chills. It was quite windy regardless. A balmy 14F inside the coop... Door open to secured run as usual (24/7), but everyone was inside. All looked and acted normal. Too windy to be outside is...

I am also in Central NJ. Nighttime lows will not be -11F without the wind chill factored in. Single digits, yes, below 0F, not tonight. If your coop is well ventilated without drafts, disregard wind chills. If your birds are cold hardy, fully feathered, and healthy, they will be fine till temps...

I too am so sorry for your loss. Most all here have suffered similar losses while raising a flock. I would suggest you take your revenge and frustration on this predator, and the one who will ultimately follow, by creating a predator proof structure to contain and thwart all efforts from...

GFIC will protect you from electrocution, but you will want a combo GFIC and an arc-fault circuit interrupter also known as an arc-fault detection device, AFIC, a circuit breaker that breaks the circuit when it detects an electric arc in the circuit. It protects to prevent electrical fires and...

Great job on your coop! I once had a water heater built exactly like yours. In my experience, water condensation developed on the bottom of the metal water heater while in use. When removing the waterier to refill, the condensation would drip, cold water striking the hot bulb and shatter...